


for whom the bell tolls

by divinerenjun



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Angel/Demon Relationship, Angel/Demon Sex, Corruption, Explicit Sexual Content, M/M, Secret Relationship, Selfcest, Soulmates, slight animal cruelty to butterflies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-04
Updated: 2020-12-04
Packaged: 2021-03-10 03:35:48
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,457
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27607057
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/divinerenjun/pseuds/divinerenjun
Summary: Angel and demon, torn apart during creation, tied together by desire. The good and bad of a single soul reunited by the allure of the forbidden.Jaemin gives himself to his demon, and his demon gives everything in return, and they are happy.
Relationships: Na Jaemin/Na Jaemin
Comments: 36
Kudos: 87
Collections: Challenge #3 — soulmates





	for whom the bell tolls

**Author's Note:**

> [secret](https://open.spotify.com/track/64i1dyG9Td5z5Q0TCG17Pb?si=Mfi9rSN1QgSyo-5N80XTUw) \- maroon 5
> 
> jaemcest is a magical concept. please climb aboard this hell train with me <3

When the church bells in God’s kingdom chime noon, they raise a cacophony so loud it can be heard in the underworld. That sound drives fear into the very heart of all Hell’s creatures, no matter where they hide. 

Hovering in the empty gray void of Purgatory, pressed deep inside just such a creature, an angel shivers in trepidation. The bells are muted here, raucous beauty dissipating out across the atmosphere of nothing, but their chiming is like the cocking of a shotgun to him: a promise of destruction.

“Nana!” The demon cries the angel’s hell-given nickname, and Jaemin tries to ignore the frantic beating of his own heart, like fatal drums echoing in his chest. 

He bends, presses his chest against the demon’s hellfire-hot back, and reaches to wrap a hand around his mouth. “Sh, Jaemin,” he soothes, gripping the demon’s waist tight enough to leave deep purple bruises. They’ll fade in a day—but not before the same marks appear on Jaemin’s own skin, revolting reminders of this time, this act, and the immortal bond between them.

Angel and demon, tied together as one. A single soul split in two: the good and the bad of a spirit, separate but homogenous. Drawn to each other by the allure of the forbidden. 

Jaemin savors it this way: the glory of demon Jaemin’s coal black wings spread like an open book, fluttering on either side of his delicately dangerous body; the velvet clench of him; the way his lips mouth Jaemin’s name against his fingers. He likes seeing him like this—seeing _himself_ like this. The demon’s hair is stark blond, curled, gel-like, in a comma across his forehead—Jaemin can’t see it from this angle, but he knows it’s bouncing with every thrust of his hips. Other than their hair colors and styling, and the palette of their wings, they are identical.

If Jaemin focuses— _really_ focuses—he can almost feel the ghost of his own cock fucking into himself. The curse of a shared body and a decent imagination: after their first encounter, Jaemin has been able to picture the two of them together in any position imaginable, switching their roles if he likes, painting new pictures of dirty defiance when he gets bored. It’s so difficult to pretend he doesn’t enjoy wrecking himself, and being wrecked by himself, that he doesn’t even try anymore. 

It doesn’t happen like this often. Demon Jaemin prefers to take him—to _ruin_ him—most nights, calling him that sickening, unholy moniker— _Nana_ —and making him feel disgusting, used, God’s dirtiest servant. 

It is sacrilegious. 

They will be discovered. That is inevitable. When an angel meets their demon counterpart, there is always disaster. 

It is difficult for even God’s most holy creations not to succumb, not to give in to the corruption. _He is me,_ Jaemin remembers thinking. _We are the same,_ and the demon has proved this to him countless times, knows every one of his deepest desires before he even admits them to himself—knows just where to kiss, or to bite, or to burn, that will make Jaemin impossibly more a part of him. Jaemin falls before him every night, willing prey, as so many have done before and so many will come to do. Angel and demon, torn apart during creation, tied together by desire. 

Jaemin wonders what disaster will befall their uncovering. A war, perhaps. An archangel’s death. The wrath of God herself raining down upon the heavens, turning those bell chimes to sirens screaming anger and pain.

As his demon writhes beneath his chest, Jaemin casts such thoughts from his mind and fucks the disgraceful half of his soul until they come at precisely the same moment, twin bodies resonating with their shared pleasure: a violent burst of color in the dust-grey void.

  


Nothing changes in the angel’s daily life. He spends his time guarding those mortals that will one day join him in the divine realm—protecting them, guiding them down the holy path, and ignoring the urge to scream warnings in their ears: _You will be torn in two. You will never be whole again. Enjoy your primal urges while you may still succumb to their calling, for in the afterlife there is no pleasure. There is no harmony. You will be torn in two and you will wish nothing more than to be One again._

He doesn’t want to be one with his darkest self again, not really, for who would fuck him then? Who would make him writhe, and hurt, and scream God’s name like an SOS: _Save us from our sin if you really care, if you really meant for us to be so criminal._

Nothing changes except everything, and Jaemin does not know how to rid himself of the invisible sin painting itself across his skin like a scarlet letter emblazoned on his chest. Doyoung nearly catches him one day—spots a bruise around his wrist when his sleeve rides up and grabs his hand, watches with Jaemin as the purple fades to a dull yellow and slowly dissipates to match the rest of his arm in a matter of seconds. Twenty-four hours since his demon pinned him to a dirty brick wall. Twenty-four hours since Jaemin allowed himself to whisper those three filthy words to a being who could never reciprocate.

 _You are beautiful,_ Jaemin had whispered in his demon’s ear. No confessions of love—nothing so insubstantial. To declare a demon, the very epitome of dirt, a thing of beauty is to declare that Jaemin has given up hope of this situation turning to their favor.

His demon half will never be able to reciprocate. He is able only to see the bad, the ugly, the disgusting, but some weak part of the angel’s mind had begged in that moment to hear the same praise from his intoxicating lips. Instead, he’d hiked Jaemin’s leg up higher against the bricks and bitten into his shoulder hard enough to draw blood. 

Jaemin thinks that’s good enough for him.

  


His demon’s eyes are so black as to seem liquid. Like deep pools of ink, waiting to spill over and write a story of burning destruction across the paper-white feathers of Jaemin’s wings. 

When Jaemin notices the same ink-black begin to seep out in a ring around his own irises, he gouges four deep scars into the wall of his bedroom with claws that haven’t seen the light of day since his creation. He stares at them in wonder as the wall smooths over in a matter of seconds—benefits of living in a literal cloud—and thinks that his demon would probably like to feel their sharp points digging into his hips. 

  


Nothing changes except everything, and when Jaemin is in Heaven, he feels like everyone is staring at him as he passes by and does his duties. No one treats him any differently on the surface, but the entire realm feels like a watched pot ready to boil as soon as he turns his back.

Jaemin suspects they all know. How could they not? They must be insulted by the way he parades around God’s kingdom as if he still belongs there when he belongs nowhere— _worse_ than nowhere, in some place reserved for creatures more abhorrent than the ones screaming furiously in the fires of Hell. 

Jeno confirms his fear one day. They’re basking in the infinity pool—a shallow depression in the top of a large cloud that is literally filled with the liquidized concept of infinity—and Jaemin slips under the water’s velvet surface as soon as the words leave Jeno’s mouth.

“I don’t want you to leave, Jaemin.”

Nothing too conspicuous, but Jaemin reads into the hidden meaning. _Don’t risk it, don’t risk this afterlife. Not for_ him.

The urge to grip Jeno’s shoulders and drag him underwater—hold him there until his lungs fill with liquidized time and he dissipates into the crystal clear water like miso powder—washes over Jaemin for just a _split_ second, but it’s enough to have him surging up out of the pool with a shuddering, gasping breath. He is completely dry when he lifts himself from the silky water. Jeno stares at him with concern etched into his strong features. 

Murder in the divine realm is not unheard of, but never has it been committed by an angel. His demon’s corruption has sunk into his very bones, and he stares at his shaking hands in horror, avoiding Jeno’s gaze. 

“It’s too late,” he chokes out. His fingers clench into fists. Jeno rests what is meant to be a reassuring hand on his thigh and Jaemin jerks away from his touch. “It’s too late,” he hisses, and the fear in Jeno’s eyes should be more of a warning than anything. Jaemin knows that if he looked in a mirror right now, his eyes would be black as night. 

  


They are together when the war cry rings out across the divine realms. Shaded by the thick canopy of an ancient, twisted wisteria tree in the land of the fae, Jaemin’s demon muffles his scream with a burning hand and wraps his wings tighter around their bodies—a futile attempt at shielding them from God’s eye as he destroys the last bit of Jaemin’s holiness against the rough bark. 

Their entanglement has cursed the realms with a manhunt. No corner of the land is left unscathed; all is scoured, pillaged, burned, in chase of a divided soul selfish enough to hide itself away and let the world fall to wreckage around its sinful hosts. 

Jaemin and his demon last a whole month, and the angel does not once feel the urge to turn himself or his lover over to the ruthless search parties. He is beyond feeling any impulse other than self-preservation or lust, and the thought that his sanctity has been marred so completely does not even scare him anymore.

It is a time of peace, as contradictory as that may seem. They are tucked away in a folded pocket of the realm, hidden from all but the most desperate and determined seekers. Mushrooms grow here, freckling ancient wood and coloring damp stone with their dappled toadstools. Kaleidoscopes of butterflies flock among the berry bushes, and Jaemin delights in their beauty until his demon plucks the most alluring of the majestic insects straight from the air and feeds them to him wing by gilded wing. The twisted part of Jaemin, the part that’s growing stronger with every day they spend hidden in this oasis, revels in the forbidden, feathery taste of their proboscides and antennae as they writhe in pain on his demon’s pale palm.

They spend their days wrapped up in each other to the extent that Jaemin is unsure where his skin ends and his demon’s begins. They spend their days fucking, sipping nectar from the faes’ flowers, eating butterflies, and talking without words. Jaemin finds that as his sacred nature has been defiled by his demon’s sin, so has his demon’s wickedness been softened by his purity. 

It shows in the softness of his grip around Jaemin’s waist as he presses cloud-soft kisses to the bare expanse of Jaemin’s thighs. They have long forgone clothing, preferring the ease with which they can slip in and out of the many pools dotting their sanctuary and feel the liquid golden drape of the sun across their skin in the late afternoon without their bothersome robes.

It shows in the way he cradles Jaemin’s head in his lap and feeds him sun-ripened berries, stripping each one delicately from its stem and letting Jaemin lick the warm juice from his fingers when they pop on the way to his mouth. Nearly overripe, soft to the touch, fragile skin giving easily to the once-harsh fingers on Jaemin’s beautiful, beautiful demon.

Jaemin says it at least once a day. “You are beautiful,” he whispers when his demon slides like an oil-slick otter from a pond of pure stardust, and he is — glittering, glorious, _Jaemin’s._ “Beautiful,” he tells him as he’s reduced to nothing more than a whimpering mess under Jaemin’s clawed fingertips. “Simply divine,” he coos one day when his demon fashions him a ring from the syrup of a nearby tree of myths. It sits around his finger as delicate as paper from a bible and whispers fallacies to the cool night air when Jaemin is asleep, and Jaemin thinks it’s the most precious gift he has ever received. 

Eventually, his demon is able to acknowledge his beauty and to give him the same praise, and Jaemin sucks the words from his lips like sweet, sweet nectar despite the icy chill that creeps up his spine each time. He starts paying him back with scars gouging shallow lines across his pretty chest and sex that leaves them both on the verge of tears. After a particular night when his demon begs to be called _Nana,_ Jaemin realizes that it’s growing much harder to remember which one of them is the angel and which one is the demon. 

Thus, time passes, and Jaemin’s heart begins to beat a pattern that resonates more closely to the sound of Hell’s drums than the satin tones of Heaven’s noon bells. He gives himself to his demon, and his demon gives everything in return, and they are happy.

Jaemin notices a strange sound one day, one that rouses him from a nap among the lilies and sets every fine hair on his body on end. 

Hellhounds, sniffing around the seam that separates their pocket from the rest of the realms. 

His demon pets a shaking hand through his dew-damp hair and traces the seam of his lips with a soft thumb. His midnight eyes have a ring of gold around the outer edge, and Jaemin knows without words that their time together has drawn to a close. 

A silent agreement of ignorance is made. His demon bathes him with gentle hands, lathering his skin in lustrous, invigorating water from a pond of music, and sings him to sleep in tune with the notes left on his body. In exchange, Jaemin wakes his demon the next morning with his lips wrapped around his cock and rough hands tugging feathers from his dusty-gray wings. 

“I don’t want you to leave,” his demon chokes out upon waking, an echo of Jeno’s sentiment so many weeks ago, and Jaemin lets him come down his throat while he grips tightly to the hand adorned with his beautiful myth ring—as close to a promise of ‘forever’ as he can bring himself to make. 

  


When Jaemin falls, his soul is one once more, and that is the worst punishment of all. 

**Author's Note:**

> <3 angel/demon relationships are very fun. thank you for reading!!!
> 
> [twt](https://twitter.com/divinerenjun) | [cc](https://curiouscat.qa/divinerenjun)


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